Babysitter Friendship

Rickie: Name's Ricki. I lived here since long before the Big. And I used to watch a kid named Kurdy when I was like twelve, thirteen for extra cash.
Kurdy (grinning in recognition): Holy shit. You used to give me baths.
Rickie: Don't go getting any ideas. It really is you. I can't believe it, purdy Kurdy, all grown up.
Kurdy: Rickie, you've been here all this time?
Rickie: Come on, I'll show you around.

—'Jeremiah, "City of Roses"

Whereas the Badly Battered Babysitter trope defines a child tormenting their caregiver, and the Babysitter from Hell trope defines a caregiver tormenting the child they're hired to take care of, the Babysitter Friendship trope defines a relationship where both the child and the caregiver see each other as pals who greatly look forward to seeing each other. See Magical Nanny for when the sitter is both female and has a profound effect on the entire family, and Marry the Nanny for when this good relationship extends to a romance with a single parent.

If the sitter is a teenager or a young adult, she may be a Cool Big Sis (or a Cool Big Bro if male) to the kids she looks after. If they're older, they may become an Honorary Uncle or Honorary Aunt. Such friendship shows up a lot in Child Care and Babysitting Stories.

Truth in Television for many children. Admit it, when you were a kid, there was probably at least one "fun" babysitter whose visits you were really excited for.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Doraemon: Nobita and the Robot Kingdom has a farming robot named "Robby" who forms a friendship with his owner's young daughter, even playing ball with the child after work. Unfortunately, the Robot Kingdom's human queen practices Fantastic Racism and promptly has Robby arrested to be stripped of emotions.
• In Gakuen Babysitters, Ryuuichi is required to help staff the Babysitters Club as part of the circumstances of his adoption. After getting over some initial awkwardness, he quickly becomes close to all of the kids under his charge and becomes like a big brother to all of them.

Comic Strips

• Calvin and Hobbes: Downplayed. Calvin and Rosalyn's relationship had always been Babysitter from Hell / Badly Battered Babysitter until the last few strips featuring Rosalyn, where the two finally reach an agreement to do what the other asks. Calvin obeys her and does his homework, and Rosalyn agrees to play Calvinball with Calvin, which they both end up legitimately enjoying, having finally put their issues aside and becoming friendly with one another. However, as this arc was the last to feature Rosalyn, their new friendship was never explored beyond that.
• Baby Blues: For a while, the MacPhersons had a regular babysitter named Kiki. Darryl and Wanda liked her because she was The Ace (and she was willing to work for two bucks an hour), and Zoe liked her so much she would shoo her parents out the door whenever Kiki came to babysit.

Fan Works

• In the The Loud House fanfic Babysitter from Heaven, the younger kids, especially Lincoln, strike up a fast friendship with their babysitter for the night, Carol Pingrey, with Lincoln even considering her an honorary sibling. Shame this sets off Lori's Berserk Button.
• The "Babysitters Club" at Skyhold Academy consists of Rory, Nessa, Jim, Krem, and Cole, who look after the toddler children of their teachers on occasion throughout the series. The teenagers dote on the little guys.
• In The Simpsons: Team L.A.S.H., Anastasia Burns seems to have a close friendship with her babysitter, Greta Wolfcastle. Once she heads off to college, the two of them still keep in touch and send letters to each other.

Films — Live-Action

• Annabelle Comes Home: Judy Warren has a wonderful relationship with her babysitters Mary Ellen and Daniela Rios, almost like older sisters. The two older girls look out for Judy even when they're not being paid and attend her birthday party and get her gifts. Judy entertains and protects them, even comforting Daniela after learning of her father's passing. When supernatural creatures threaten all of their lives, all three ensure the safety of the others.
• The Babysitter (2017): Twelve-year-old Cole has a fantastic relationship with the titular character, his babysitter Bee. They have all sorts of inside jokes, she defends him from bullies, and she never once teases him for being geeky. She's also drop-dead gorgeous, so naturally, he's got a huge crush on her. All of this makes it genuinely heartbreaking when he finds out she's part of a murderous cult. Broken Pedestal and Et Tu, Brute? are in full force here. She saves his life, and he opts to stay with her until she dies because they still genuinely care for each other, but he flatly rejects her offer to join her.

Literature

• The Baby-Sitters Club: All the members of the club usually have a great relationship with the sitting charges, and many of the books involve one of them befriending the main kid of the story. However, the most consistent example is Charlotte Johanssen and her favorite sitter Stacey (pictured above); they are so close throughout the books that they consider themselves sisters.
• Alex Rider: Alex's housekeeper, Jack, babysat him when he was younger. She went on to become one of his closest friends.
• The Amber Brown books have Brenda, whom Amber describes as being her favorite "Amber-sitter," despite her being a Cordon Bleugh Chef. She does things like helping Amber with her homework and teaching her Broadway songs.
• The second book of The Map to Everywhere introduces Marrill's babysitter Remy, who Marrill finds a little irritating, but once she's swept onto the Pirate Stream and speedily takes several levels in badass, the two become firm friends.

Live-Action TV

• Jeremiah:
  • A Family of Choice group in "And the Ground, Sown with Salt" includes a girl who was orphaned in her infancy by the Big Death and her former babysitter turned adoptive mother (who was just young enough to survive the Big Death).
  • In "City of Roses", Kurdy encounters a woman who babysat him when she was thirteen and he was six, and they greet each other happily and discuss how she spent days trying to find him after his parents died.
• Stranger Things: Steve Harrington. While initially a Jerk Jock in a relationship with Nancy which ends in a breakup, he soon forms an Odd Friendship with Dustin, one of the main kids in the series. From there, Steve quickly becomes amicable with the rest of the Hawkins Gang, becoming their "babysitter" of sorts.

Webcomics

• Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures: According to Abel, his babysitter Cindy was the only friend he had before his family moved to Zinvth. They actually exchanged letters long after that.
• Erma has the titular character and her babysitter Felicia, who get along well. This is pretty impressive on Felicia's part considering Erma is a Half-Human Hybrid Stringy-Haired Ghost Girl with supernatural powers to match who likes to play pranks and Felicia is just an ordinary human (mind you, one that loves classic horror movies and isn't afraid to take on supernatural threats to Erma, even to the point of defending her from Wittle Wallace after he pulls a Grand Theft Me on Felicia.) This is good, considering that Erma's previous babysitter ended up in a mental ward.

Western Animation

• Milo Murphy's Law: "Secrets and Pies" reveals that Milo is still good friends with his childhood babysitter Veronica, who was the only one who could keep up with Milo's perpetual bad luck. Milo's Hammerspace backpack, which he uses to carry anything he might possibly need when disaster strikes, was a gift from Veronica.
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
  • Twilight Sparkle has a sisterly relationship with her old foalsitter (and now sister-in-law) Princess Cadence.
  • Pinkie Pie becomes the regular foalsitter of the Cake siblings despite some initial trouble when first watching them. They seem to love her a lot and she likes playing games with them.
• In the last season of Rugrats (1991), the parents hire Taffy, the grandniece of Lulu, Lou's second wife, to look after the babies while Didi goes Back to School to master her degree in child development. Taffy is a songwriter who has her own band, Taffy and the Saltwaters, and she has a soft spot for babies, whom she calls "Minis". The babies befriend her, and she takes them to wonderful places such as Boingo Burger, a fast food restaurant featured in "Hold the Pickles", and a video arcade featured in "Diapies and Dragons". Taffy even narrates the stories of Snow White and Jack and the Beanstalk in the "Tales from the Crib" duology of Direct to Video movies.
• The Justice League Action iteration of Courtney Whitmore, AKA Stargirl, has such a great relationship with her sitting charge, Timmy, that he excitedly rushes into her arms and says her name over and over whenever she comes to look after him.
• The Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood episode "Daniel's Babysitter" has Daniel being babysat by Prince Tuesday, the older brother of his friend Prince Wednesday and the son of King Friday. The two get along very well, pretending together that they're in the jungle and singing about how grownups always come back.
• The Canadian Halloween Special Witchs Night Out features two children, Small and Tender, who are delighted to learn that they're going to be spending an evening in the care of their favorite babysitter, a young man called Bazooey.
• BB3B: Lucy and Louie are on good terms with Chubba, their babysitter. When he is fired in "Robanny", the twins attempt to get him back.
• Family Guy: After Brian Griffin befriended the son of a single mom he was dating in "Boy's Best Friend", he later became the son's babysitter after he and the mother broke up.
• Dexter's Laboratory: Dexter gets along really well with his babysitter, Lisa, as not only is Lisa a Friend to All Children, but Dexter has a Precocious Crush on her.
• In Baby Blues, Bizzy, Zoe's babysitter, has a good relationship with the parents while acting like a baby's big sister.

Real Life

• Jean Renoir had a strong friendship with his mother's cousin and babysitter Gabrielle Renard, as depicted in this painting◊ by his father Pierre-Auguste. Her fascination with the then-new motion pictures influenced Jean to become a filmmaker.

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